1887
Volume 24, Issue 4
  • ISSN 1018-2101
  • E-ISSN: 2406-4238

Abstract

During the 2012 U.S. Presidential campaign, President Obama turned some heads by stating “If you’ve got a business – you didn’t build that”. His opponents argued that this was an attack on private enterprise (with “that” referring to business), while his supporters and fact-checking organizations maintained that “that” referred to what Obama was talking about previously (U.S. infrastructure) and represented his political-economic plan of an increased interlacing of private business with government investment. I argue, from a relevance-theoretic perspective, that both interpretations follow from differing contextual assumptions on the part of the audience. In this sense, the role of contextual assumptions in utterance interpretation is highlighted – different contextual assumptions lead to different cognitive effects if the utterance leaves room for more than one interpretation. Combined with a highly polarized U.S. political arena, where participants pounce on their opponent’s every possible miscue, all the ingredients for misunderstanding are present.

Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1075/prag.24.4.07zak
2015-12-02
2024-12-04
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Ariel, Mira
    (1990) Accessing Noun-Phrase Antecedents. Bristol: Routledge.
    [Google Scholar]
  2. (2001) Accessibility theory: An overview. In T. Sanders , J. Schliperoord , and W. Spooren (eds.), Text Representation: Linguistic and Psycholinguistic Aspects. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, pp.29-87. doi: 10.1075/hcp.8.04ari
    https://doi.org/10.1075/hcp.8.04ari [Google Scholar]
  3. Bach, Kent
    (1992) Intentions and demonstrations. Analysis52: 40-146. doi: 10.1093/analys/52.3.140
    https://doi.org/10.1093/analys/52.3.140 [Google Scholar]
  4. Bou-Franch, Patricia
    (2002) Misunderstandings and unofficial knowledge in institutional discourse. In D. Walton , and D. Scheu (eds.), Culture and Power: Ac(unofficially) knowledging Cultural Studies in Spain. Bern: Peter Lang, pp.323-341.
    [Google Scholar]
  5. Carston, Robyn
    (2002) Thoughts and Utterances: The Pragmatics of Explicit Communication. Oxford: Blackwell. doi: 10.1002/9780470754603
    https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470754603 [Google Scholar]
  6. (2007) How many pragmatic systems are there?. In M.-J. Frappoli (ed.), Saying, Meaning, Referring: Essays on the Philosophy of François Recanati. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp.18-48.
    [Google Scholar]
  7. (2009) The explicit/implicit distinction in pragmatics and the limits of explicit communication. International Review of Pragmatics1: 35-62. doi: 10.1163/187731009X455839
    https://doi.org/10.1163/187731009X455839 [Google Scholar]
  8. Carston, R. , and Alison Hall
    (2012) Implicature and explicature. In H.-J. Schmid (ed.), Cognitive Pragmatics. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, pp.47-84.
    [Google Scholar]
  9. Chafe, Wallace
    (1994) Discourse, Consciousness, and Time: The Flow and Displacement of Conscious Experience in Speaking and Writing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  10. (1996) Inferring identifiability and accessibility. In T. Fretheim , and J.K. Gundel (eds.), Reference and Referent Accessibility. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, pp.37-46. doi: 10.1075/pbns.38.03cha
    https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.38.03cha [Google Scholar]
  11. Clark, Billy
    (2013) Relevance theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/CBO9781139034104
    https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139034104 [Google Scholar]
  12. Furlong, Anne
    (1995) Relevance theory and Literary Interpretation. London: University College London [dissertation].
    [Google Scholar]
  13. Goodman, Bradley A
    (1986) Reference identification and reference identification failure. Computational Linguistics12.4: 273-305.
    [Google Scholar]
  14. Grice, Herbert Paul
    (1975) Logic and Conversation. In H.P. Cole , and J.L. Morgan (eds.), Speech Acts [= Syntax and Semantics, vol. 3]. New York: Academic Press, pp.41-58. Reprinted in Paul H. Grice (1989) Studies in the Way of Words. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, pp. 22-40.
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Gundel, Jeanette K
    (2010) Reference and accessibility from a Givenness Hierarchy perspective. International Review of Pragmatics2: 148-168. doi: 10.1163/187731010X528322
    https://doi.org/10.1163/187731010X528322 [Google Scholar]
  16. Gundel, Jeanette K. , Nancy Hedberg , and Ron Zacharski
    (1993) Cognitive status and the form of referring expressions in discourse. Language69.2: 274-307. doi: 10.2307/416535
    https://doi.org/10.2307/416535 [Google Scholar]
  17. (2012) Underspecification of cognitive status in reference production: Some empirical predictions. Topics in Cognitive Science4: 249-268. doi: 10.1111/j.1756‑8765.2012.01184.x
    https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1756-8765.2012.01184.x [Google Scholar]
  18. Hall, Alison
    (2007) Do discourse connectives encode concepts or procedures?Lingua117: 149-174. doi: 10.1016/j.lingua.2005.10.003
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2005.10.003 [Google Scholar]
  19. Lamb, Clarice
    (2005) Misunderstandings – a sociolinguistic view on meaning. Letras de Hoje40.1: 231-241.
    [Google Scholar]
  20. Maes, Alfons , and Christ De Rooij
    (2007) (How) do demonstratives encode distance?InProceedings of DAARC 2007, Lagos Portugal. Centro de Linguistica da Universidade de Porto, pp.83-89.
    [Google Scholar]
  21. Mirecki, Paweł
    (2008) Misunderstandings and communication failure in Relevance theory – a problem revisited. In E. Mioduszewska , and A. Piskorska (eds.), Relevance Round Table I, pp.77-85.
    [Google Scholar]
  22. Padilla Cruz, Manuel
    (2012) Epistemic vigilance, cautious optimism and sophisticated understanding. Research in Language10.4: 365-386. doi: 10.2478/v10015‑011‑0040‑y
    https://doi.org/10.2478/v10015-011-0040-y [Google Scholar]
  23. Recanati, François
    (2004) Literal Meaning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
    [Google Scholar]
  24. Scott, Kate
    (2013)  This and that: a procedural analysis. Lingua131: 49-65. doi: 10.1016/j.lingua.2013.03.008
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2013.03.008 [Google Scholar]
  25. Sperber, Dan , and Deirdre Wilson
    (1993) Linguistic form and relevance. Lingua90: 1-25. doi: 10.1016/0024‑3841(93)90058‑5
    https://doi.org/10.1016/0024-3841(93)90058-5 [Google Scholar]
  26. (1995²) Relevance: Communication and Cognition. Oxford: Blackwell.
    [Google Scholar]
  27. (2004) Relevance theory. In L.R. Horn , and G. Ward (eds.), The Handbook of Pragmatics. Oxford: Blackwell, pp.607-632.
    [Google Scholar]
  28. (2005) Pragmatics. In F. Jackson , and M. Smith (eds.), Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp.468-501. Reprinted in D. Sperber, and D. Wilson (2012), pp. 1-27.
    [Google Scholar]
  29. (2012) Meaning and Relevance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi: 10.1017/CBO9781139028370
    https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139028370 [Google Scholar]
  30. Travis, Charles
    (2008) Occasion-Sensitivity: Selected Essays. Oxford: Oxford University Press. doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199230334.001.0001
    https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199230334.001.0001 [Google Scholar]
  31. Wilson, Deirdre , and Tomoko Matsui
    (1998) Recent approaches to bridging: Truth, coherence and relevance. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics10: 173-200. Reprinted in D. Sperber, and D. Wilson (2012), pp. 187-209.
    [Google Scholar]
  32. Yus, Francisco
    (1999) Misunderstandings and explicit/implicit communication. Pragmatics9.4: 487-517.
    [Google Scholar]
  33. Zaki, Mai
    (2011) The Semantics and Pragmatics of Demonstratives in English and Arabic. Hendon: Middlesex University [dissertation].
    [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1075/prag.24.4.07zak
Loading
  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): Accessibility; Demonstratives; Misunderstandings; Obama; Relevance
This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was successful
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error